I recently spent a week in the fairytale that is Norway, land of fjords and mountains and all that is beautiful in the world. Here's a breakdown of my $1500 budget: from flights, to transportation, to food, to everything else.

A cross-country or transatlantic flight without access to wifi is the perfect opportunity for a few hours of productivity. Granted, it’s also the perfect opportunity for a nap, but if you’re wired on coffee or without a window to rest your head against comfortably (and even then I use the word “comfortable” loosely), you might as well use that 6 hours of shooting through the sky in a metal tube at 35,000 feet up (aviation is a MIRACLE) to check off some boxes on your to-do list in your too-cute notebook agenda. (May Designs are my favorite agendas and notebooks!)

Below are some ways I try to take care of bidness when I am wifi-less on a flight, whether that’s because wifi isn’t offered or I don’t want to pay for it (‘cuz let’s be real, your girl’s on a budget.)

If you can have a city-version of the love of your love, then London is mine. I studied for a semester in that delightfully-dreary city and have been madly in love with the place since. Try as I might, I’ve not found a legal way to make London my dwelling place, though I’m currently accepting applications for a British beau. But if I can’t have a permanent London address, I can settle for an annual pilgrimage across the pond to the city that holds my heart. Here are my recommendations for planning your own trip to London.

An American flag hangs over a painting in their modest apartment. They’ve been in America only a few months now. She knows a bit of English, and I know zero Arabic or Kurdish, so we do our best to communicate with hand gestures and Google translate. She’s taking an English class and shows me a notebook of the words she’s learning. She tells me the Kurdish word for flower. And then she tells me that I am a flower. She’s a wife, a mom, a woman just like me.